Spy Handler

by Victor Cherkashin

  Polyakov was recruited in 1961 during a tour in New York. He had access to top state secrets, including valuable information on GRU operations. He disclosed intelligence on military planning, nuclear strategy and chemical and biological weapons research. He also provided documents about Soviet weapons, including antitank missiles; reported on the state of the Vietcong during the Vietnam War; and handed over more than one hundred classified issues of the Red Army’s Military Thought, which was published for the leadership and discussed top secret plans and strategy.3

  Polyakov’s information on our deteriorating relations with the Chinese in the 1970s helped President Richard Nixon make his historic decision to travel to Beijing in 1972, a major diplomatic breakthrough for the Americans that opened relations with Communist China. Polyakov also exposed a good number of spies.

  His information led to the betrayal of at least six American military officers and one British officer who had spied for us. He fingered the Briton by taking photographs of his spy photographs of documents about U.S. guided missiles. Using Polyakov’s prints, the CIA tracked the spy down to the British Aviation Ministry. I don’t know whether the GRU investigated the disclosure of so many of its agents. What’s clear is that the agency failed to detect the source of leaked information.

  The son of an accountant, Polyakov was born in Ukraine in 1921 and, like Penkovsky, was decorated for action as an artillery officer during World War II. In the 1950s, he served in the General Staff before being posted to New York to work undercover as a U.N. diplomat. He was commended for his efforts and sent back at the end of the decade, this time as deputy GRU rezident. After his start spying for the Americans, he went on to serve tours in Burma and India, where he was promoted to general in 1974.

  Polyakov spied for the Americans for eighteen years, until he began falling under suspicion in 1978. That year, information about his activities—and those of another U.S. agent code-named FEDORA by the FBI—were leaked to the American press by CIA counterintelligence chief Angleton, who suspected the two were double agents. Soon thereafter, American journalist Edward Jay Epstein published a book about Lee Harvey Oswald. It offered the same evidence, obtained from the CIA or FBI. FEDORA, an agent named Alexei Kulak, had by then died, but Epstein’s book led to his posthumous exposure. (Code-named SCOTCH by the CIA, Kulak was a Soviet science and technology intelligence officer who’d been awarded the prestigious Hero of the Soviet Union medal.)

  Suspicions about Polyakov were further confirmed in 1979 when an FBI agent in New York contacted AMTORG (the Soviet trade organization serving as a front for the GRU) and handed over a secret FBI list of Soviet diplomats thought to be intelligence officers. The spy also gave information indicating TOPHAT was indeed Polyakov. That FBI agent was a junior officer named Robert Hanssen.

  It was impossible not to react to Hanssen’s intelligence about Polyakov. In 1980, the GRU recalled the general from an extended trip to Delhi and reassigned him to a Moscow desk job. The agency didn’t arrest him, however. Although multiple sources had fingered Polyakov as an American spy, the GRU refused to believe that one of its top officers would commit treason. While the GRU welcomed Hanssen’s intelligence, it suspected the FBI operative was a double agent. The information on Polyakov was only circumstantial, and those pushing for a serious investigation lacked hard evidence to convince the doubters. Polyakov’s supporters claimed the accusation was an American attempt to discredit the service’s officers. More important, perhaps, was the GRU leadership’s unwillingness to see one of its own on trial for treason. The KGB, for its part, was kept out of the affair.

  Polyakov of course knew the information about him was accurate and managed to confirm through friends in the GRU that he was under investigation. Fearing the probe would close in on him, the general retired soon after moving to Moscow and the GRU closed its investigation. From then on, Polyakov lay low, spending most of his time in the country. That strategy worked. He lived in peace until his new exposure in 1986, this time by Aldrich Ames.

  Polyakov was at his beloved dacha on July 4, a Friday, when he received a request to attend a retirement ceremony at GRU headquarters the following Monday. He had reason to suspect his imminent arrest—two ambulances were parked nearby, an obvious sign that he was under surveillance. He showed up at the GRU building on Monday morning in full dress uniform. Approaching the entrance, he was seized, stripped and searched before being locked up in Lefortovo prison, where most spies were held. He was later executed. One of his two sons serving in the GRU committed suicide soon thereafter.

  Polyakov was one of many spies put on trial following the KGB’s recruitment of Ames and Hanssen during and after the so-called Year of the Spy, 1985. But he occupies a special place on the list because none of the other agents ranked so high in the Soviet intelligence community and none came close to spying so productively for so long. Managing to elude arrest for twenty-five years while working for the FBI, Polyakov was a unique case that spoke to his handlers’ professionalism and the ineffectiveness of the Soviet security services in tracking him down.

  Like Penkovsky, Polyakov has been portrayed as a “true” patriot who believed Russia had been hijacked by the Communist Party. Also like Penkovsky, he’s said to have made an ideological conversion when his GRU work opened his eyes to the true nature of the system he’d fought to defend during the war. That was also how he presented himself to his contacts in the CIA and FBI, making a point of refusing money and only occasionally accepting presents such as hunting and fishing gear.

  There’s another similarity between Polyakov and Penkovsky: Their motives for betraying the Soviet Union have been simplified to fit a political line. Most assessments of Polyakov’s treason omit one key fact, the fate of his son. In fact, Polyakov became disillusioned with the Soviet Union and the GRU during his second tour in New York. That year, the youngest of his three sons fell ill. Polyakov asked the GRU rezidentura to allow him to check in to a New York hospital for a life-saving operation. Permission was denied. Polyakov was desperate, but could do nothing. His son died. Soon after, Polyakov approached a diplomatic contact, a high-ranking U.S. Army officer who directed the Soviet general to the FBI.

  Brent Scowcroft, national security adviser to President George H.W. Bush, asked me during a U.S. conference in 1997 why I thought Aldrich Ames betrayed his country—and whether I thought it possible to prevent treason. I replied that the only way to be absolutely safe is to remove people from intelligence gathering. Guaranteeing full security would require leaving espionage to satellites, computers and other technology. That is impossible—human contributions are by far the most important component of intelligence gathering. And as long as people are involved, security threats can never be completely eliminated.

  Intelligence agencies do everything possible to avoid the inevitable betrayals, something to which I dedicated most of my career. They start by employing complicated screening processes to hire their officers. The KGB selected candidates thought to be patriotic, loyal to the service and faithful to their families, friends and coworkers. People so heavily vetted for their political trustworthiness are highly unlikely to become disillusioned with the policies and ideology of their countries simply through spontaneous changes of heart. (The possibility can’t be ruled out, but it’s improbable.) That was especially true of Soviet officers, who were perceived to be—and saw themselves as—the cream of society’s elite. Consequently, intelligence agency claims that officers commit treason because of ideological motives usually fit a disinformation strategy. Such reasoning ordinarily serves a larger propaganda effort to justify the dastardly action of convincing someone on the other side to betray his country. It’s an attempt to show that the other guy’s political system is bad and ours is good.

  In fact, loyalties switch for less elevated reasons than patriotism, ideology and love of country. Often it’s not belief in one or another ideology that changes but circumstances, which are usually beyond the control of intelligence chie
fs. Rivalries flourish among coworkers. Promotions are awarded unfairly. Polyakov was left with bitter anguish over his superiors’ refusal to let his son undergo an operation in an American hospital. That inexcusably heartless decision led the general to inflict great damage on his country.

  Spies tend to focus on their personal problems, not political ones. Most don’t want to betray their countries and refuse to see themselves as traitors. They simply want to solve an immediate problem or satisfy a kindled ambition, and spying offers itself as a possibility. Money is a key motivation. Another is proving self-worth, as in the case of Penkovsky—as well as Aldrich Ames and Robert Hanssen twenty years later. “I’m a good intelligence officer and I’m doing a useful job,” a potential agent might say. “But my bastard boss can’t see how well I work. He likes flattery and he dislikes me because I’m honest.” Perhaps the boss really is a jerk. But perhaps he has good reasons for disliking his subordinate. Maybe the offending officer is lazy and drinks too much. The fact is that potential spies, with justification or not, often feel slighted.

  Betrayal has existed since the dawn of civilization. It’s no mistake that espionage, the subject of a chapter in Sun Tzu’s The Art of War (400 B.C.), is called the world’s second-oldest profession. Only later, once the decision to spy has been made, ideological reasons present themselves to justify the choice of treason. At the same time, betrayal will continue to pose as large a threat as it did for intelligence agencies during the Cold War unless society stops viewing the primary motivations for espionage as ideological—that is, unless the public stops buying the stories told by intelligence agencies. As long as punishment for espionage remains as dire as certain imprisonment (it was usually death in the Soviet Union), spies will have greater motives to broaden their activities than to come clean or stop their espionage before it becomes too serious. To pressure Aldrich Ames into betraying most CIA agents in the Soviet Union, I would remind him of the risks he was taking under U.S. law—and give him enough time to consider the consequences of his earlier, far less damaging actions. Thus prepped, as it were, he chose to protect himself by wading irrevocably deeper into the waters instead of retreating.

  5

  INTRIGUE AT MOSCOW CENTER

  1

  In 1975, I was back in Moscow. I’d been promoted to colonel and appointed deputy head of Directorate K’s European department. I reported to my old classmate Oleg Kalugin, who had returned from Washington to head foreign counterintelligence. The move was another major boost to my career. I was now in charge of counterintelligence operations against the CIA throughout Europe, including the Soviet Bloc’s Eastern European countries. I’d finally be working in an important post in the Center, fighting the Main Adversary in the backyard of its closest allies—especially Britain, France and West Germany.

  My office was in the new KGB compound on Moscow’s outskirts in Yasenevo, which had opened three years earlier, in 1972. The complex included a twenty-story main building, several wings, conference halls, a gym, a swimming pool and a large park. Aside from inadequate air conditioning, it was a vast improvement over the old offices in Lubyanka. There had been big changes within the directorate, too. In his drive to combat the intelligence agencies of the major capitalist states, above all the United States, KGB chairman Yuri Andropov had beefed up the First Chief Directorate’s foreign counterintelligence wing. As I studied our operations in Europe, however, I realized much remained to be done to make counterintelligence effective. Counteracting the CIA wasn’t a high priority in most European rezidenturas; some KGB stations didn’t have a single agent with access to information on American intelligence. Rezidenturas instead focused their efforts on penetrating their host countries. The exceptions were the stations in Bonn and Karlshorst, outside Berlin, which did exceptional work, thanks partly to their large size and top-level cooperation with the East German secret service, the Stasi.

  I began visiting the rezidenturas under my jurisdiction to boost their operative work and ratchet up activities against the CIA, monitoring and exposing CIA pitches to Soviets in Switzerland, Germany and Greece. In the Soviet Bloc countries, cooperation with and trust in the various intelligence services differed in each case, generally reflecting the state of relations with Moscow. We were close to the Bulgarians, respected the Czechoslovaks and had cool relations with the Poles. The Stasi provided by far the best cooperation. Our German “friends” were consummate professionals, planning and executing their operations scrupulously. They also had excellent sources that delivered valuable information on NATO, U.S. military and CIA activities. I regularly traveled to Berlin to oversee joint KGB–Stasi operations.

  The American press would later claim that the two services were so close that information gleaned from the Stasi archives after the Soviet collapse led the CIA to Aldrich Ames in 1994. That could not have happened. Despite its unusually strong ties with the Stasi, Soviet intelligence never disclosed agents’ identities to officers who didn’t need to know them—let alone to foreign services. Files on valuable agents were held in the strictest secrecy. While the KGB often provided intelligence generated by important agents to the East Germans, sources wouldn’t have been named, so the Stasi files couldn’t possibly have contained documents showing the KGB had a particular agent inside the CIA.

  In mid-1977, I received information from the Stasi that an old Beirut target of mine was working on assignment in Bonn. It was MARS—the CIA operative in Beirut who had used the safe house in which we installed cameras and bugs, allowing us to document his meetings with agents. That information had never been used. Perhaps now was the time.

  MARS’s mistake—the blame for which can be spread around the CIA Beirut station as a whole—was failing to adequately check his safe house for eavesdropping devices. I would try to recruit the American by confronting him with the evidence. There might be a chance that he’d rather collaborate with us than see his sloppy work exposed to his superiors, which might stall his career or precipitate other negative repercussions. Kalugin supported my proposal. It was forwarded to the FCD chief, who also approved it.

  Bonn wasn’t the best place to pitch a CIA officer. West Germany’s ties with the United States were extremely close. If MARS reported my attempt to recruit him, it could have serious consequences for me, including arrest. Moreover, no one in the KGB knew MARS, which would make it difficult to establish first contact. I had to play the operation by ear, hoping to corner him at a diplomatic reception or other such event.

  Arriving in Bonn, I started watching for MARS’s name on various pilfered invitation lists. Three weeks went by without a sign, and my trip began to look like a waste—until his name was spotted on a schedule for an American corporate presentation in a downtown restaurant. Showing up as a Foreign Ministry official under an assumed name, I spotted the slightly aged MARS and maneuvered toward him to strike up a conversation about international relations. The fair-haired American officer, who was in his early forties, of medium height and a slightly stocky build, was easy to talk to. Our discussion seemed to go well. When I proposed continuing our acquaintance, he readily agreed. I suggested meeting in my hotel.

  Two days later, I descended to the lobby to wait for my target. As usual before a recruitment attempt, I was anxious but also excited. The confrontational “cold pitch” was one of the riskiest methods, putting great psychological pressure on a target, and often failed. Even when successful, it often produced agents whose handlers had to maintain constant pressure on them to stay involved. When such agents had a chance to cut their ties—when they were assigned to new posts or when communication with their contacts became risky—they often took it.

  MARS showed up smiling. He seemed pleased to be meeting a Soviet “diplomat.” We went upstairs to my room and sat in armchairs across a small table. I offered a whiskey, which he accepted. We resumed our discussion about international relations and went on to talk about Bonn’s tourist sites. Then I got down to business.

  “Let me
tell you the real reason for my visit to Bonn,” I said. “I’ve come to convey an offer from the Soviet Union you might find interesting. Please understand I’m doing this as a friendly gesture.”

  MARS assumed a poker face but didn’t reply. “We know you work for the CIA,” I continued. “We have information about your activities in Beirut.”

  MARS had likely suspected I was a KGB officer and may have been expecting some kind of pitch. But he didn’t seem to have anticipated my knowing about his Lebanon posting. Nonetheless, he quickly recovered his cool. He could spot where the conversation was going and struggled to manipulate it.

  “I don’t think the fact that I work for the CIA is particularly discrediting,” he replied wryly.

  “Yes, working for the CIA isn’t particularly discrediting, you’re right. But we have other information about you. I don’t want to make your life difficult, I want to make you an offer. We can discuss it and do whatever is best to avoid any negative repercussions for your career.”

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” MARS replied.

  “How would your superiors feel about your disclosing agents to us?” I pressed.

  Struggling to maintain his composure, he remained silent.

  “Let’s take a look at the facts,” I continued, reaching for a folder in my briefcase. I took out photographs of the Beirut safe house MARS had used. They included shots of the interior and close-ups of our hidden video and audio recording devices.

  MARS’s face blanched. As he examined the prints, I imagined him mentally running through his meetings in the apartment, considering the possible damage our eavesdropping could have inflicted on the CIA. He sat back in his chair. “You’re right,” he sighed. “This is a serious failure. For me and the CIA.”